dkos: Lee Atwater Lives!

[Coexist]

http://www.dailykos.com/story/2008/4/16/221752/394/117/497198

I used to think Republican operative and Karl Rove mentor Lee Atwater had died in 1991, after a nasty career of Republican race baiting, culture wars, dirty tricks, and a illness-induced conversion to Catholicism and public repentance for his dirty and divisive politics. I was wrong. Lee Atwater apparently works for ABC News in devising bullshit questions to ask Democratic Presidential candidates.

The questioning in tonight's debate--—mostly straight out of 1988—was an abomination. Gun control. 60's radicalism. Inflammatory black pastors. Respecting or disrespecting the flag. Taxes. Being out of touch with the military. Affirmative Action.

I'll bet if they had more time, ABC anchors Charles Gibson and George Stephanopolus would probably have gotten around to asking Obama and Clinton about Willie Horton and Piss Christ.

In case you were wondering, as well as I can recollect, Gibson and Stephanopolus were too concerned with "bitter" and flag pins and superexcellentness of cutting the capital gains tax to ever get around asking Obama and Clinton questions about any of the following subjects:

The financial crisis
The collapse of housing values in the US and around the world
Afghanistan
Health care
Torture
The declining value of the US Dollar
Education
Trade
Pakistan
Energy
Immigration
The decline of American manufacturing
The Supreme Court
The burgeoning world food crisis.
Global warming
China
The attacks on organized labor and the working class
Terrorism and al Qaeda
Civil liberties and constraints on government surveillance

For those who think it's great that Hillary Clinton won't drop out, even though there's no way she can win the nomination and her only hope is some bizarre destruction of Barack Obama between now and the convention, ponder the effects of tonight's debate. The questions asked were not the kinds of questions Democratic primary voters care about. But they are the "gotcha" kinds of questions Republicans try to spring on Democrats in general elections.

I'm not afraid of those questions. I think Obama did fine tonight. Generally Clinton has performed best in debates, but as we first saw in the Texas debate, Obama appears to perform better one-on-one. I especially liked how he refused to get lured in to Charles Gibson's conservative frames, and I like how he dismissed many of Clinton's attacks on him as avoiding the substantive issues and hypocritical, as when he pointed out that Bill Clinton pardoned members of the Weather Underground.

But I don't want Hillary Clinton on the stage with him while he fends off bullshit like what was tossed at him tonight. I want him to be able to pivot around and use the questions—accusations in most cases—against John McCain. I want John McCain to have to fend off Obama's counterpunches, not a Democratic Senator from New York.

There's more to say about the performance of Obama and Clinton. And I'm sure some will say, "who cares about the delegate count, or the polls that show voters don't trust her, or that she fares worse against McCain, or that there's no way short of coup by superdelegates that she can become the nominee, she should stay in the race." But first, share your thoughts with ABC about their performance by clicking here.

Perfect.

(Mods - I am awaiting approval to post the entire thing - I'll delete this sentence when I get it. Thanks)